Can I add a few new chicks to chicks currently in my brooder?

[MamaH]

Hi there! New to this, just got 4 chicks a week ago through the mail. All doing great! Love them so much! A local feed store has some chicks now and I was thinking of adding 1 or 2. Would I need to keep the new ones separate from the existing (quarantine)? If so how long? Or can I just put new chicks in with the existing? Or should I just wait until these are grown and get more chicks another year? The existing are now just a few days over a week old. I want to do whatever is best for the chicks I currently have. I am realizing now that I should have originally ordered a few more! Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thanks so much!

 

[Yay Chicks!]

I'm pretty sure that I've read somewhere that within a few days (weeks?) you should be able to put them together and be fine. That being said, I have no experience with it...

 

[LPeaslee]

I added 4 EE chicks from a feed store one week after I received 20 assorted chicks from Idea. I didn't have any problems.

 

[SlipsWife]

You shouldn't have any issues adding them into your existing group. I still dip their beaks and put paper towels down with feed on it for the first day or so to get their attention but you really don't have to. The new guys will follow the others. The last time I held a couple back and moved the majority of the first group out and adding the older chicks in with the younger ones, it worked great.

 

[cafarmgirl]

When I have chicks in the brooder I always end up popping in a couple here and there within the first week or so. That is the hazard of visiting feed stores during chick season when you've got your brooder up and running lol! But no, there should not be any problem. I pop new chicks in with the group, husband walks by, eyes brooder closely, "Is there more now or were there always that many?" Lol.

 

[Spangled]

No worries. I do it all the time. I hatch a few, order a few, and buy a few locally all at around the same time so that I can brood them all together. Usually up to 2 weeks difference in age is no problem and I've worked with 3 weeks (sometimes those feed store chicks just can't be resisted). I just keep a close eye on them if they are two weeks apart. Sometimes I will set up a separate little brooder in a moving box for the older chicks for a few days, giving the more permanent brooder container to the youngers. Then after the youngers have eating and drinking figured out (1--3 days), I pop the olders into the more permanent brooder container. The olders will have less interest in picking on the youngers because the youngers are owners of the territory and the olders are the newbies to the flock. However, if a few days difference is all we're talking about, which it sounds like what you're doing, there will likely be no problems. Just watch. It is usually easier as pie to introduce now. The feed store chicks should be from a hatchery that should be free from disease, so quarantine shouldn't be an issue. And introducing now is 100 times more easier than growing out another batch next spring. Have fun! What are the breeds you couldn't resist? ;-)

 

[gander007]

My brooder gets new chicks every week or so and I have chicks up to three weeks apart in age but never more then twenty at any given time unless they are all from the same hatch then the limit is around forty to the brooder ...

In this photo there are two different hatches ten days apart ..

gander007

 

[MamaH]

Thanks so much everyone! That helps me a ton! Im going to go ahead and add a few more!

 

[MamaH]

One more question! Do I raise the temp back up to 95 with the new chicks? My current chicks are at 90 degrees going down to 85 on Wednesday. Not sure how to handle the temperature between the two in the same brooder.

 

[LPeaslee]

That's exactly what I did, I haven't seen any adverse effects. I figured the older chicks would just move to a more comfortable area.